Course Syllabi

• Cultural Immersion Seminar
• Interdisciplinary Health Care Across Cultures
• Family Theory and Intervention Across Cultures
• Practicum in International Family Focussed Nursing

COURSE TITLE:Cultures, Communities, and Health Care

CREDIT HOURS:3 Semester credits (2 cr. Theory, 1 Cr. Participant-observation)

COURSE DESCRIPTION:

This course introduces students to three frameworks useful for understanding how nurses become culturally sensitive and provide culturally competent care. The focus of study is on cultural sensitivity, cultural competence, and the evaluation of health care systems in light of each country’s culture, economic status, health status, and threats to health. Students will complete three web-based modules, engage in participant-observation in a health care institution/agency, and visit policy-making bodies and government agencies. The three modules include:

Concepts of Culturally Congruent Health Care and Nursing (for students who have not had a course on nursing and culture at the undergraduate level)

• Selected Models of cultural competence
• Global Perspectives of Public Health Issues
• National Models of Health Care practiced in the host countries and others and their interface with the political system and the community (public health).

COURSE OBJECTIVES:

• Examine the foundation concepts of culturally congruent nursing
• Critically analyze selected models of cultural competence in terms of concepts they include.For example, one model includes the concepts of awareness, knowledge, skill, encounter, and desire.
• Compare and contrast health care policy relative to cultural groups in home, host, and other countries.
• Articulate the strengths and weaknesses, including cultural fit, of selected health care delivery systems
• Analyze health care policy implications on both health care professionals and consumers.
• Critique the socio-economic impact on families of health-care needs and services
• Integrate a global perspective in participant-observation experiences.

CONTENT OUTLINE:

The web-based course involves three or four modules of study, depending upon whether students have had an undergraduate transcultural nursing course. Each module consists of a list of readings, writing assignments, field activities and evaluation procedures. The four modules include:

Module I.	Concepts of Culturally Congruent Health Care and Nursing (for students who have not had a course on nursing and culture at the undergraduate level)
Module II.	Selected models of cultural competence CONFHER Model (Fong) Giger & Davidhizer- Transcultural Assessment Model Explanatory Models of Illness and Disease (Kleinman) Sunrise Model (Leininger) Purnell- Model for Cultural Competence
Module III	Global perspectives of public health issues
Module IV	National models of health in the host countries and others their interface with the political system their interface with the community (public health)

Participant-observation experiences:

1.Self assessment

2.Cultural heritage

3.Assumptions about cultural differences

4.Participant-observation in an agency serving a minority population. Analyze services the agency provides, funding, population using the agency, State regulations and Policies directing the agency, language services, needs, and suggestions for improvement.

5.Complete a health assessment using an interpreter. Examples of sites in Columbus include:

• Community Refugee and Immigration Services
• Native American Indian Center
• Asian American Community Services
• Ohio Hispanic Free Clinic
• Jewish Family Services
• Refugee Resettlement Program

6.Visit a health policymaking body and examine their role in policy development, implementation, enforcement, and evaluation. Examples of sites in Columbus include:

• Ohio Commission on Minority Health
• Ohio Department of Health
• Franklin County Department of Health
• Ohio Senate and House of Representatives

COURSE EVALUATION:

• Objective test measuring knowledge of or paper demonstrating use of culturally congruent nursing concepts influencing patient care including culture, cultural values, ethnicity, ethnocentrism, cultural blindness, acculturation, assimilation, cultural diversity, prejudice, bigotry, racism, institutional racism, and genocide.
• Comparison of two cultural competence models and application of a cultural competence model to care of a family from a minority population.
• Position paper on the interface between health care and government in a selected country of study.
• Case study of health care policies reflected in individual and family care.